By Douglas V. Gibbs
The Petition Clause, found in the First Amendment, reads, “Congress shall make no law…abridging…the right of the people…to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” The concept was deeply rooted in English constitutional tradition and American colonial practice. It was not an abstract right to be heard, but a concrete, procedural mechanism for popular influence over the legislature.
The Declaration of Independence states, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
The United States was not established to be a democracy. Throughout history, democracies have proven to be dangerous. They always devolve into oligarchies. The Founding Fathers understood that consolidating power into any single place is dangerous—and that includes power in the hands of the people. But at the same time, the voice of the people is the most important safeguard of a stable system of liberty. How do you create a government that derives its powers from the consent of the governed without allowing it to devolve into a pure democracy?
Democracy can only be present in a system in limited form without becoming destructive. The federal government, as originally designed, possessed only one office that was democratically elected—members of the United States House of Representatives. Senate officeholders were originally appointed by the state legislatures. The President was originally chosen by the electors, with no nationwide popular vote as we have today. Judges are appointed, as are other officers of the federal government. The people’s democratic voice was intended to be present only in the House of Representatives.
Then how, one might ask, does a government derive its powers from the consent of the governed?
The American System, in a sense, is a Frankenstein’s monster. It was formed not as an aristocracy, democracy, monarchy, theocracy, or any other pure form of government one might see elsewhere in the world or throughout history. It is a republic, meaning it is grounded in the rule of law, and it takes from each of those systems only their better qualities.
A pseudo‑aristocracy was established by giving the states a voice in the Senate. Democracy was satisfied by providing the House of Representatives to the people, whose members are democratically elected. Theocracy was avoided through the Establishment Clause, yet the Founding Fathers recognized the importance of Faith’s influence on government. Therefore, in the First Amendment, they also ensured that government could not pass laws prohibiting the free exercise of religion. The concept of religious freedom through the Free Exercise Clause helps maintain a Christian foundation, while the Establishment Clause prevents government from becoming a pure theocracy. And the advantages of monarchy were included in two ways:
- A President (but not a king) who possesses certain external authorities (like Commander in Chief and Foreign Affairs), yet is limited by law. His job is not to rule, but to execute the laws.
- A government that has the power to govern (rather than rule), but can be reined in by the republican attributes already mentioned, and through petition. Petition is the key component drawn from the long history of British monarchy, while also satisfying the key component that Jefferson wrote about in the Declaration of Independence: the consent of the governed.
“We the People of the United States,” the first words of the Preamble, are embodied in the God‑given natural right of petitioning the government for a redress of grievances.
The right to petition possessed a direct inheritance from English practice. The right to petition the monarch and Parliament was a long-established, if often perilous, tradition in England. It was considered a fundamental liberty, distinct from the privilege to vote. The English Bill of Rights of 1689 explicitly affirmed the “right of the subjects to petition the king.”
This is the beginning of the Introduction of the next book I am writing – a book that provides a history of the Petition Clause, and how we may resurrect it so that we may use it in today’s battle against tyrannical government. The new book, Petition the Government for a Redress of Grievances (The Forgotten First Amendment Right), should be available for purchase within the next couple weeks.
